The local paper for Downtown wn A DENTIST GOES HOLLYWOD < 15 MINUTES, P.21
WEEK OF MAY
21-27 2015
SEAPORT BUILDINGS TO BE PARTIALLY DEMOLISHED City to tear down rear of iconic buildings on the South Street Seaport BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS
The New York City Economic Development Corporation is planning to demolish portions of both the New Market Building and the Tin Building on the South Street Seaport. The agency said the “cooler areas” that are attached to the rear of both buildings, on the East River side, were deemed to be dangerous and precariously close to collapsing. Both cooler areas, which were used to store fish when the South
Street Seaport was an active market, are attached to their respective buildings and portions of both buildings will be demolished as well, said an EDC spokesperson. “In April, EDC and its structural engineers inspected both buildings and found them to be increasingly unsound, but of utmost concern to us are the cooler areas, which run along the back of both the Tin and New Market buildings,” said the EDC in an email to Our Town Downtown. “This area was determined to be in danger of imminent collapse and must be demolished.” The New Market Build-
ing, which dates back to 1939 and sits adjacent to Pier 17 at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge, sits atop a parcel of land that the Howard Hughes Corporation is proposing to build a 494-foot luxury residential tower. The tower proposal has been at the center of a bitter land use dispute since late-2013 between preservationists at the Seaport and the developer. The EDC spokesperson stressed that the agency’s decision to partially demolish the building is unrelated to Howard Hughes’ interests in the area.
Our Take THE PRICE OF SUNSHINE
The front of the New Market Building. The New Market Building as seen from East River Drive. The low slung “cooler area” at the rear of the building on the water is set to be demolished by the city’s Economic Development Corporation. A similar cooler area is also set to be demolished at the nearby Tin Building.
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WALKING FOR A CAUSE NEWS AIDS walk raises millions, drawing New Yorkers from around the city BY HEATHER E. STEIN
All in a day’s walk. More than $4.8 million was raised by 30,000 walkers at this year’s annual AIDS Walk in Central Park on May 17, the country’s largest and most visible single-day event in response to the AIDS epidemic. Opening ceremony participants included the famous -Tyne Daly and David Hyde Pierce -- to the lesser-known, including Brooklyn’s Black & Gold Marching Elite. “We are encouraging children to join a cause they believe in,”
How is it that someone can build a 600-foot building in New York and not have to ask a soul for permission to put the thing up? Community Board 5 this week took the unusual step of calling for a temporary moratorium on new skyscrapers along Central Park South until the de Blasio administration can come up with some kind of zoning plan. The move, unusually aggressive for any community board, highlights the Wild West nature of development in the city at the moment. Throughout Manhattan, massive new buildings are popping up in a skyscraper race not seen in a generation. The buildings are transforming the city’s skyline and remaking its neighborhoods -- all without any input from those of us on the ground. In a report that focused on the buildings along 57th Street, Community Board 5 said it was seeking to protect citizens’ “access to sunshine,” an amenity many of us thought came free. According to a report in Capital New York, seven supertowers are underway and five more are planned in midtown. These shadows “disturb community access to sunshine in the park,” according to the community board. A spokesman for de Blasio said the mayor’s office is reviewing the report, which seeks a halt to new construction while some kind of zoning and public review plan is drawn up. Count us dubious about whether any of that will happen. But at least this community group is trying, reminding all of us that in today’s New York, nothing, not even sunshine, is guaranteed.
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FOR HIM, SETTLING SMALL CLAIMS IS A BIG DEAL presided over Arbitration Man has three decades. for informal hearings about it He’s now blogging BY RICHARD KHAVKINE
is the common Arbitration Man their jurist. least folks’ hero. Or at Man has For 30 years, Arbitration court office of the civil few sat in a satellite Centre St. every building at 111 New Yorkers’ weeks and absorbed dry cleaning, burned lost accountings of fender benders, lousy paint jobs, and the like. And security deposits then he’s decided. Arbitration Man, About a year ago, so to not afwho requested anonymity started docuhe fect future proceedings, two dozen of what menting about compelling cases considers his most blog. in an eponymous about it because “I decided to write the stories but in a I was interested about it not from wanted to write from view but rather lawyer’s point of said Arbitration view,” of a lay point lawyer since 1961. Man, a practicing what’s at issue He first writes about post, renders and then, in a separatehow he arrived his decision, detailing blog the to Visitors at his conclusion. their opinions. often weigh in with get a rap going. I to “I really want whether they unreally want to know and why I did it,” I did derstood what don’t know how to he said. “Most people ... I’d like my cases the judge thinks. and also my trereflect my personalitythe law.” for mendous respect 80, went into indiMan, Arbitration suc in 1985, settling vidual practice
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MANHATTAN'S APARTMENT BOOM, > PROPERTY, P.20
2015
In Brief MORE HELP FOR SMALL BUSINESS
The effort to help small seems to businesses in the city be gathering steam. Two city councilmembers, Robert Margaret Chin and Cornegy, have introduced create legislation that wouldSmall a new “Office of the within Business Advocate” of Small the city’s Department Business Services. Chin The new post, which have up told us she’d like to would and running this year, for serve as an ombudsman city small businesses within them clear government, helping to get through the bureaucracy things done. Perhaps even more also importantly, the ombudsman and number will tally the type small business of complaints by taken in owners, the actions policy response, and somefor ways to recommendations If done well, begin to fix things. report would the ombudsman’s give us the first quantitative with taste of what’s wrong the city, an small businesses in towards important first step fixing the problem. of for deTo really make a difference, is a mere formality will have to the work process looking to complete their advocate are the chances course, velopers precinct, but rising rents, -- thanks to a find a way to tackle business’ is being done legally of after-hours projects quickly. their own hours,” which remain many While Chin “They pick out boom in the number throughout who lives on most vexing problem. said Mildred Angelo,of the Ruppert construction permits gauge what Buildings one said it’s too early tocould have the 19th floor in The Department of the city. number three years, the Houses on 92nd Street between role the advocate She Over the past on the is handing out a record work perThird avenues. permits, there, more information of Second and an ongoing all-hours number of after-hours bad thing. of after-hours work the city’s Dept. problem can’t be a said there’s with the mits granted by nearby where according to new data jumped 30 percent, This step, combinedBorough construction project noise Buildings has data provided in workers constantly make efforts by Manhattan to mediate BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS according to DOB of Informacement from trucks. President Gale Brewer offer response to a Freedom classifies transferring they want. They knows the the rent renewal process, request. The city They 6 “They do whatever signs Every New Yorker clang, tion Act go as they please. work between some early, tangible small any construction on the weekend, can come and sound: the metal-on-metal or the piercing of progress. For many have no respect.” p.m. and 7 a.m., can’t come of these that the hollow boom, issuance reverse. owners, in business moving The increased beeps of a truck has generto a correspond and you as after-hours. soon enough. variances has led at the alarm clock The surge in permits
SLEEPS, THANKS TO THE CITY THAT NEVER UCTION A BOOM IN LATE-NIGHT CONSTR NEWS
A glance it: it’s the middle can hardly believe yet construction of the night, and carries on full-tilt. your local police or You can call 311
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